To Be State Senator, He Must Beat the Incumbent, Again

By JONATHAN P. HICKS

Published: October 18, 2000

BUFFALO, Oct. 16—
When he entered a barber shop on this city's northeast side recently, Byron W. Brown, a city councilman and the victor in a highly competitive State Senate primary in September, was treated as though he were a celebrity.

Mr. Brown was greeted by the shop's owners and customers not only because he had beaten the incumbent Democratic state senator in that primary but also because they clearly think he is a sure bet to become the first black state senator from a district outside of New York City and its suburbs -- let alone from western New York.

''You're making history,'' said one smiling man in the barber shop.

Mr. Brown, 42, a slight man who is always impeccably dressed, nodded and returned the smile. But afterward, he returned to a theme that he presses as his campaign works toward the Nov. 7 general election. He must once again face the man he defeated in September: State Senator Alfred T. Coppola.

''I take nothing for granted,'' Mr. Brown said. ''We're working hard on this.''

Mr. Coppola, who remains on the ballot on the Conservative, Working Families and Green Party lines, said he was sure that his defeat in the primary was essentially a fluke that was likely to be reversed in the general election.

Mr. Brown's victory, Mr. Coppola said, was the result of a surge in the turnout of black voters energized by a vigorous and nearly successful challenge to Assemblyman Arthur O. Eve, the longest-serving member of the Assembly and western New York's dominant black political figure.

Mr. Coppola, 58, contends that while the challenge to Mr. Eve brought out black voters who then also voted for Mr. Brown, turnout in the November election will be larger, and hence more representative of the total district population.

''This election will be a lot different,'' said Mr. Coppola, who is white. ''I have a lot of supporters who did not come to the polls in the primary. But with this being a presidential race and with Hillary Clinton running for Senate, they will come out in November.''

The Republican in the race, Harrison R. Woolworth, a Buffalo businessman, has not held political office before and is not expected to draw many votes.

The 57th State Senate District runs along Lake Erie and includes large sections of Buffalo, Grand Island and Niagara Falls. In the 1990 census, non-Hispanic white residents accounted for 59 percent of the district and black residents made up about 35 percent. About 5 percent of the district was Hispanic.

Mr. Coppola was elevated to the State Senate in November after Anthony R. Nanula, the Democratic incumbent, was elected comptroller of the city of Buffalo.

Mr. Coppola, a former restaurateur who served on the city's Common Council for 17 years, then won a special election in March this year. In doing so, he amassed the support of nearly all of the Democratic Party officials and organizations in the district.

Even in the primary, Mr. Coppola had the support of various Democratic organizations, as well as the support of Anthony M. Masiello, the mayor of Buffalo. Mr. Brown had little in the way of organized political support.

A member of the council for four years and a graduate of Buffalo State College, Mr. Brown first gained notice politically while working as an aide to Mr. Eve, the deputy speaker of the Assembly. He later worked as director of the Erie County division of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Mr. Brown is a former vice president of Grassroots, a large political organization in Buffalo that has helped several candidates win elective office.

During the campaign, Mr. Coppola was heavily criticized by many Democrats for appearing to focus exclusively on one topic: lowering the utility rates in the area. Mr. Brown, on the other hand, emphasized a number of issues, from strategies to cut the costs of public construction and the police force to the rehabilitation of urban neighborhoods.

In the end, Mr. Brown stunned most Democrats with a resounding victory with a margin of about 18 percentage points.

But while Mr. Brown might view his election next month as something less than a certainty, a number of prominent Democrats have added their names to his list of supporters, including the state comptroller, H. Carl McCall; Andrew M. Cuomo, the secretary of federal Housing and Urban Development; and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

''All of the party machinery has shifted to me now, which is pretty good,'' Mr. Brown said. ''But we're still working on this like we did before the primary.''

Mr. Coppola, meanwhile, insists that he will fare far better in November. ''The blacks came out in numbers and voted for Byron Brown, although I did get some support in the black community,'' he said. ''In the white community, I won two to one, but with a very poor turnout. That will be different this time.''

Photo: Byron W. Brown hopes to move up from the Buffalo Common Council. (Don Heupel for The New York Times)